The City's only large residential complex is the Barbican , a phenomenally ugly and expensive concrete ghetto built on the heavily bombed Cripplegate area. The zone's solitary prewar building is the heavily restored sixteenth-century church of St Giles Cripplegate (Mon-Fri 9.30am-5.15pm, Sat 9am-noon), situated across from the infamously user-repellent Barbican Arts Centre ( www.barbican.org.uk), London's supposed answer to Paris's Pompidou Centre, which was formally opened in 1982. The complex does, however, serve as home to the London Symphony Orchestra and the London chapter of the Royal Shakespeare Company, and holds free gigs in the foyer area.
